


At Home With You

by blanketed_in_stars



Series: 52 Weeks of Wolfstar [35]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 1995, Dementors (Harry Potter) - Freeform, Holding Hands, M/M, why do I have an obsession with hand-holding in these fics???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-05
Packaged: 2018-04-19 04:40:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4733102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blanketed_in_stars/pseuds/blanketed_in_stars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Andromeda is worried. Sirius tells her he's fine, and begins to believe that he will be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At Home With You

**Author's Note:**

> Week 35

The doorbell rings.

“When will they _learn,”_ Sirius huffs, unable to hear himself over his mother’s shrieking, “that knocking is enough?” He gives an enormous tug on the moth-eaten curtains and silence falls once more. He stalks to the door and yanks it open, expecting Hestia or Dedalus—and finds himself face to face with his cousin.

Andromeda looks like he feels; that is to say, as if she’s seeing a ghost. She flinches, just for a moment. “Sirius,” she breathes.

“Long time, no see,” he says with a miserable attempt at nonchalance. It’s hard, very hard, to watch her recoil from him as if she still believes him to be a murderer. _Maybe she does,_ whispers an insidious little voice in the back of his head, but he pushes it away. If she believed that, she wouldn’t be here, and she certainly wouldn’t let her daughter join the Order. He hopes. “What’s the occasion?”

She recovers quickly, holding her chin a little higher. “I need to speak with Dumbledore,” she says. “This seemed like the place to go.”

“He’s not here.”

Andromeda gives a short, slightly frustrated sigh. “Could I come in?” she asks. “I’ll wait until he comes by.”

Sirius stands aside, beckoning for her to come in. He closes the door behind her, grateful to shut out the heat of the August evening, and leads the way upstairs into the drawing room. As soon as they’re out of earshot of the portrait, he tells her, “He might not even stop in tonight—he doesn’t always.”

“Then I’ll try again some other day.” Andromeda follows him into the room and lets out a low whistle. “It hasn’t changed much in here, has it?”

Sirius looks around as well. “How long has it been?” he asks.

“Twenty-five years.” She eyes the tapestry, still hanging stubbornly. “Never thought I’d be back, to be honest.”

“That makes two of us.” Sirius falls into the big armchair and gestures for her to sit. “How are things with Ted?”

Andromeda raises her eyebrows, as if she can’t quite believe he’s asking her that. But after a moment she answers. “Things are fine. We’re very happy—or we would be, if our daughter hadn’t joined this group of idiot rebels.”

She says it in the same haughty tone that Sirius remembers from his childhood, and he laughs. “Yet here you are, in the lion’s den. It’s not so bad, is it?”

“No, I love doxy-infested curtains,” Andromeda scoffs, but she, too, is smiling. Abruptly, it fades. She picks at a loose thread on the cuff of her sleeve. “How are you?” she asks, her gaze on the fraying edge.

Sirius is grateful, because he has resolved to lie each and every time this question is put to him. “I’m great.”

“Don’t lie,” Andromeda orders, her eyes flashing up to meet his. For an instant she reminds him of her sister and he can see them all again, no one older than twelve, playing in the hall and trying not to make Bella angry. But the moment passes and Andromeda is simply Andromeda, who _cares._ “You don’t look great.”

“Is it the hair?” Sirius jokes. He’s been meaning to cut it, but for now it still hangs past his elbows.

“More like the circles under the eyes,” she replies dryly. “Has it been very bad since you broke out?”

There’s an old stain on the table, and it’s on this that Sirius focuses as he formulates his answer. “It was worse in the beginning,” he says slowly, “that first year particularly.” There’s no need to go into the fiasco that was the night in the Shrieking Shack—if she knows he’s innocent, what good will the rest of it do her? “It’s been easier since Remus—well, since we’ve been together.”

He watches her, trying to gauge how much she knows, and sees a funny half-smile on her face. It’s an unexpected relief. “He’s a good egg,” she says. “He doesn’t let you go to pieces.”

“Who said I went to pieces?” Sirius demands, bridling just a bit.

Andromeda rolls her eyes. “My point,” she says with an air of great patience, “is that Remus Lupin is fairly good at keeping his head, when it comes down to it, and that can be helpful for everyone involved.”

Sirius ponders that for a moment and decides that his cousin is too insightful. He thinks of all the times Remus has held him, talked him down from Merlin knows what. The way his voice curls into the dark corners and lightens them. “You’re right,” he agrees at last.

“Is he around today?” Andromeda asks.

“No.” Sirius shakes his head. “Off on Order business; he goes every few days. He just left this morning.” He tries not to let his mind dwell on the way the house feels colder already.

“Sirius,” Andromeda says, rather abruptly. “I keep thinking of the last time we saw each other. New Year’s, nineteen-seventy, wasn’t it?”

“Probably,” Sirius replies. The truth is that the memory, like so many others, has become a gray wisp of a thing in his mind.

Andromeda sighs and twists the stray thread around her finger. “I don’t regret leaving,” she says. “You know how they were. And I love Ted. You know how that is, too.” She raises one eyebrow at him, continuing before he can say anything. “The only thing I regret is leaving you alone with them. I feel—”

“Don’t,” Sirius interrupts. He gestures at the stupid tapestry. “Neither of us are on there, so you don’t need to think like that. Besides, I beat you.” He grins. “Took you eighteen years to get out, but I only needed sixteen.”

Andromeda hesitates, appearing unconvinced.

“Honestly, Dromeda,” he says, “I don’t blame you. I never did. And you can stop worrying about me. Things are better now.” And they are. He manages to remember it once in a while. He has nights without bad dreams sometimes, and whole days where he doesn’t lose track of the time. What was it Remus said the other day, the quote from one of his Muggle books? _It’s only a passing thing, this shadow._ Today, more than ever, he understands.

Downstairs, the front door bangs open. Sirius leaps to his feet as the portrait begins to scream about half-breeds and blood traitors. “That’ll be Remus and Arthur Weasley,” he tells Andromeda. “Odd. I didn’t think Remus would be back for—”

“Sirius,” Remus says from the doorway. “Arthur says—oh. Hullo, Andromeda.” He rubs a hand over his face as if to scrub it clean.

“Is something wrong?” Sirius asks. He knows that tone, that tension of the shoulders.

“Well,” Remus says, and chuckles without any humor. “Arthur heard from Dumbledore that Harry’s been attacked by Dementors.”

“What?” Andromeda gasps, as Sirius experiences a wave of nausea. “But he lives with Muggles!”

“That makes it worse,” Remus tells her. “He used the Patronus Charm, he’s all right, but the Ministry’s going to pounce on it. Dumbledore’s trying to sort things out. Sirius—Sirius, he’s fine.”

“I heard.” Sirius fights the closing-up of his windpipe and just looks at Remus. There is a slight ringing in his ears, though that could be from the sudden silencing of his mother in the hall below. “Dementors—why?”

“I don’t know,” Remus says, coming closer and embracing him as if he knows how unhelpful his words are. Their chests push together as Remus inhales and Sirius takes comfort in the closeness. Too late, he remembers Andromeda, and turns to find her edging closer to the door.

“I ought to go,” she says when he sees her. “I can’t help, I’m not an Order member—and there’s not going to be an opportunity to speak with Dumbledore tonight, is there? No, I’d best be off. But let me know if there’s anything I can do.” She’s gone before he can reply.

“Why does she need to talk to Dumbledore?” Remus asks.

Sirius shrugs. “She didn’t say.” He takes a deep breath against another burst of secondhand panic. “Harry’s not hurt?” he checks.

“Not a scratch on him,” Remus assures him. “He’s very capable.”

“Thank Merlin you taught him that charm.” Sirius reaches for Remus’s hand and squeezes it. _He’s fine. He’s all right._

What sounds like five or ten people come in through the door, all chattering loudly, and of course it sets the portrait off again. But the screeching stops just as abruptly as it began. _”Silence!”_ booms the magically modified voice of Albus Dumbledore. He continues more quietly as the everyone falls silent. “We will discuss what has happened in the kitchen.”

Sirius is already moving towards the landing when Remus holds him back. “Are you sure? If it’s too much, we can stay up here, someone will tell us—”

“I’m fine,” Sirius tells him, the second time he’s said it within the hour, although he can scarcely remember ever feeling less fine. “I want to help, however I can.”

Remus looks doubtful, but he leaves it there. “All right.”

“Just—” Sirius stops himself this time, a few feet from the door. “Don’t let go of my hand.”


End file.
